


The New Vintage

by kmo



Category: Hannibal (TV)
Genre: Angst, F/M, Jealous Hannibal, Pre-Series
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-07-26
Updated: 2017-07-26
Packaged: 2018-12-07 07:28:06
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,495
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11618835
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/kmo/pseuds/kmo
Summary: There's a new man in Bedelia's life. Hannibal isn't too happy about it.





	The New Vintage

**Author's Note:**

  * For [NotPersephone](https://archiveofourown.org/users/NotPersephone/gifts).



> For bedeliainwonderland who requested wine tasting, Hannibal spying on Bedelia's date, and jealous!Hannibal.

Across the crowded wine emporium, a sandy-haired man bends his head to whisper in the ear of a familiar blonde. There can be no mistaking it; Bedelia is out again with that man—boy, really. It is the second time in as many weeks that he has seen them together. The first he had wishfully chalked up to coincidence, the two of them deep in conversation inside Bedelia’s favorite brasserie. He could have been a distant relative, Hannibal had supposed, or a fledgling psychiatrist Bedelia had taken under her wing. Heaven knows he looked like he was barely out of medical school. Over the din of the patrons, he hears a rich, rare, musical sound which he recognizes as Bedelia’s laughter. Hannibal’s lip gives an involuntary curl and this year’s Beaujolais Nouveau turns to vinegar in his mouth.

In two strides, Hannibal crosses the length of the room and inserts himself between Bedelia and the man he presumes to be her date. “How are you finding the new vintage?” he asks, radiating all the affability his person suit will allow.

The man turns to him, nonplussed, and replies, “Too many fig notes this year for my taste. I prefer the ’09. Just the right balance of tart and sweet, with a delightful cherry finish, as I was telling my companion here.”

Hannibal, unfortunately, can’t fault him. The ’09 was an excellent year.

Bedelia has gone quiet and pale. Her gaze flicks nervously, forming a triangle between her companion, Hannibal, and the rim of her wineglass.

“And you, Bedelia? What do you think of this year’s Beaujolais? Frankly, I am surprised to see you at this tasting. I know your preference for older, more complex vintages.”

“I like it,” she says, soft ring of defiance in her voice. He knows and she knows they are not just talking about wine.

Her companion looks between the two of them. “You two know each other?”

Bedelia stares at him, waiting for him to make the introduction; as his psychiatrist it is against protocol for her to acknowledge him in public unless he does so first. “Bedelia and I are old friends.”

“Colleagues,” she amends.

“Forgive my rudeness. Dr. Hannibal Lecter,” he says, offering the other man his hand. Bedelia’s young man encloses it in a firm, confident shake. “And you are?”

“Jason Ambrose. Also doctor,” he says with a twinkle in his eye that Hannibal supposes it meant to be self-deprecating and endearing.  _Jason_. It really is a boy’s name.

“A new resident?” Hannibal hazards.

“Jason has just been appointed the new DuPont professor of cardiology at Hopkins,” Bedelia answers, eyes flashing steel.

“My most sincere congratulations. Welcome to Baltimore.”

“Thank you, Dr. Lecter. I’m settling in finally. It helps to have a tour guide as lovely as Bedelia to show me the sights.” He wraps his arm gently about Bedelia’s waist, but she does not lean in to the embrace. Her eyes are cool and focused solely on his own.

“Then you are doubly blessed,” Hannibal says with false sincerity. “If you will excuse me.”

Hannibal leaves the tasting early. The angry, jealous fire blazing inside his chest cannot be quenched by wine.

*

Stanford undergrad, Marshall fellowship to Balliol, Harvard Med, and residency at MGH. The youngest man ever to be appointed to full professor at Hopkins. Jason is perfectly pedigreed on paper. He was also polite and somewhat charming, if bland, in person. Hannibal supposes he might pass for handsome, in an obvious All-American kind of way.

There’s nothing Hannibal can find wrong with the man. Somehow this makes him loathe him all the more.

A shame, really. His larder needed refilling.

*

There are five minutes remaining in his weekly hour with Bedelia. It had been the tensest, lease productive session between them in years. She had asked vague, generic questions and he had responded with monosyllabic replies, the two of them pirouetting about the subject that occupied both their minds.

Bedelia glances at her watch. “I thought you might wish to discuss our encounter at the wine emporium last week.”

“What is there to discuss?” he asks, subtly needling her.

“We do not often meet each other socially. It can be…difficult…for a patient to see his or her psychiatrist in the real world. For some it shatters the intimacy of therapy.”

His wounded feelings rise to the surface, a churning dark tide he cannot control. “You were on a date,” he says at last.

“Yes, I was.” A long pause. “Did it bother you to see me on a date?”

“Why would it bother me?” he snaps back waspishly.

She looks back at him, her eyes deep blue pools filled with silence. Her eyes that always seem to say everything and nothing to him at once

“He is…adequate, I suppose. A bit young.” Bedelia arches a brow, but he continues. “ _Wunderkind_ , as I’m sure you know, often have contentious relationships with their parents, and seek out maternal figures in adulthood. It is easy to understand his attraction.”

Bedelia is seething. She exhales sharply through her nostrils, and for a moment he expects fire to emerge instead of breath. “I am your psychiatrist, Hannibal. You are not mine. You are not Dr. Ambrose’s either. You would do well to remember that.”

“I have told you before, I feel protective of you…”

“Protective? Or merely possessive?” When he makes an attempt to qualify his statement, she shakes her head. “That is all for today. I’ll see you next week.”

He notices her hurry, her uncharacteristic foregoing of their after session wine. “Another date?” he asks, every syllable soaked in poison.

“Yes,” she says, words dripping with a false cheer she knows will wound him. She glares at him all the way to the door.

*

He does not go home.

He drives his Bentley around the block and parks it a discreet distance from Bedelia’s house. Close enough that he can spy her front door with his binoculars, but far from her obvious line of sight. Dusk falls and he waits.

At precisely seven, a black BMW pulls in Bedelia’s driveway. He can add punctuality to another of  _Jason’s_ virtues. Bedelia greets him at the door. She smiles, but they do not kiss, and her body posture is stiff. It is early days for them still, he thinks, and it is obvious they have not yet slept together. It buoys his spirits to know that she does not seem to be aching with desire for the young cardiologist. Not in the way he knows she aches for him.

Bedelia’s date escorts her to the car and he can catch the tiniest flash of crimson beneath the hemline of her dark wool coat. Her hair is done up, the kind of style that is provocative, that makes a man’s fingers itch to take it down. His cock stirs and his jealousy burns. He should leave, he should not torture himself this way, but Bedelia with another man holds a certain morbid fascination for him, like a highway accident that he cannot look away from.

Hannibal follows them at a careful distance, noting with disappointment that young Dr. Ambrose does not speed or tailgate and makes proper use of his turn signals. They drive to a trendy part of the city near the harbor, where there are many cafes and restaurants. He purses his lips, intoxicated by his own jealousy, as Bedelia’s date opens her door for her and offers her his hand with a practiced, gentlemanly ease. His eyes track them with predatory fascination as they enter a music venue, his Bentley and his person suit the only cage keeping him from pouncing on his rival and tearing his throat open with his teeth. Young Jason is not a predator, but prey, and watching him near Bedelia is a perversion of nature; a lioness cannot mate with a gazelle.

The marquee of the club announces an evening of contemporary jazz. He scowls. Bedelia, he has learned over many years of conversation, does not like jazz. She finds the musicians show-offish, their improvisation a poor substitute for good composition. She prefers chamber music, the intimacy of a small but talented group of players. He would like to take her to hear chamber music, he thinks, the intimacy of the music mirroring the intimacy of their sessions. This man does not understand her at all, and is seemingly too arrogant to discern her tastes. Why ever would she let someone take her to taste wine she does not enjoy and listen to music she does not care for?

 _Perhaps she likes him_.

The thought is too harrowing to behold.

*

It’s nearly ten when they finally return to Bedelia’s home. Hannibal has resigned himself that the night may very well not end at Bedelia’s bronze door, that she may invite this young man inside to share the pleasures she has long denied him. But he is determined to see this evening through to its end.

They exit the car, and this time Bedelia does not wait for Jason to escort her, forcing him to hurry to catch up with her. Bedelia slides her key into the lock while her companion hovers expectantly. They chat, breath catching in the cold November air. Jason places a hand on her bicep and kisses her; Hannibal’s heart sinks like ballast.

The kiss last several moments, moments in which Hannibal forgets to breathe. It is Bedelia who pulls away, eyes downcast. She murmurs something, her gloved hand strokes Jason’s cheek once, and then she turns from him, leaving her date out in the cold. He waits there, stunned, and for a brief second Hannibal almost feels sorry for him. But to the young man’s credit, he is well-mannered enough to accept Bedelia’s rejection without protest. His proud shoulders fall; he shuffles to his automobile and drives away.

Now would be the time to return home and celebrate the vanquishing of a rival, but his curiosity is not quite satisfied. He pulls a sleek silver iPad from his briefcase and brings up a direct video feed of the inside of Bedelia’s home. He had installed the cameras months ago in the aftermath of Bedelia’s so-called attack out of concern for her wellbeing. He had feared she might become a danger to herself, or, at the very least, attempt to run. There is a part of him, a very tiny quark sized part of him, that feels guilty about invading her privacy this way. It is outweighed, of course, by his certainty that he is acting in Bedelia’s best interests.

The black and white image of her entryway is empty save for Bedelia’s coat and handbag, slung over the side of a chair. Bedelia enters from the left, glass of wine in her hand. She pauses, exits in the direction of the kitchen, and returns with the entire bottle. The bottle they might have shared together this afternoon had she not needed to prepare for her date. She sets her wine on a small console table as she kicks off her high heels, massaging her feet and ankles. Her face turns full on toward the camera and her expression is one he does not recognize. It is neither the forced smile she shared with Jason a few moments ago nor the cool mask she has shown him in their numerous therapy sessions. The real Bedelia, he thinks, the one she will not let him see. She appears vulnerable, tired…and sad. Her eyes dart toward the door—perhaps she is experiencing second thoughts. But then her expression hardens; he can visibly see her crush her regret as she picks up her wine and heads down the hall.

He checks the video feeds for the rest of the house and she does not appear on any of them; he concludes she must be in the bath. As his one concession to her privacy he did not put cameras in there. He lets himself imagine her relaxing in the hot water, splashing about in the tub. He sees it so clearly in his mind’s eye it is like he is there with her, soap bubbles sliding down the curve of her wet breast, his hands massaging shampoo through her golden hair. He groans, hard at the thought of her this way. Does she touch herself, fingers dipping beneath the water—wishing for a man to come and fulfill her, wishing for  _him_.

He entertains this fantasy until Bedelia emerges from the bath, clad in her silk nightgown. Her gait is a bit unsteady, likely due to overindulgence.

She pulls back the covers of her bed and slides beneath the snowy white sheets. She picks up a novel from her bedside table and begins to read, still sipping at the dregs of her wine absently. He can tell her book does not interest her and after a few moments she lets it drop to her lap, staring into space. Her eyelids flutter, her lips tremble, and he realizes she is crying. She does not let herself cry for long, brushing aside her tears with the back of her finely boned hand. She takes the pillow on the right side of the bed and turns it perpendicular next to her before pulling the chain on her bedside lamp. In the moonlit darkness, he can see her curl against it and recognizes the gesture for what it is: a futile attempt to find comfort and warmth.

Her loneliness pierces him, bruises him with a dull hollow ache. He sees it all so clearly now, Bedelia’s involvement with this cardiologist—a subconscious wish for someone to come and heal her own troubled heart. An attempt to find normalcy, to find happiness with an uncomplicated man who does not wear a person suit, who is simply a person. He cannot shake the sense he had stolen this from her somehow. But he knows that Bedelia is too sharp not to puncture her own illusions.

There is one thing, however, he can do and imprudently he does so. It is easy, so very easy for him to slip inside Bedelia’s home through the back door and past the security alarm she only activates when on vacation. Easier still to remove his shoes and walk up the stairs toward her bedroom, his footsteps whisper quiet on her thick carpeted floors. Her deep, regular breaths signal it is safe for him to slide alongside her in the bed, removing the pillow and substituting his own warm, broad chest.

For a moment, she stirs and asks half-asleep, “Hannibal?”

“A dream,” he whispers, stroking her golden hair. “Just a dream.”

His answer seems to satisfy her and she snuggles against him, wrapping her arms even tighter about his chest. He smiles to himself, enjoying the warmth of her, the closeness of these few stolen hours together, imagining the day when Bedelia’s dream is no longer just a dream.

**Author's Note:**

> Beaujolais Nouveau, unlike many other wines, is meant to be drunk very soon after harvesting and fermentation. It doesn't age well. The annual unveiling of the year's Beaujolais is A Thing in certain social circles and there are parties. It usually happens in November, right before Thanksgiving, so a lot of Americans think of it as a holiday wine. And that is the extent of my wine-related sophistication, friends. 
> 
> Bedelia's young cardiologist is in his early 30s. Definitely significantly younger than Bedelia but he's not exactly the Dougie Howser Hannibal is making him out to be. Hannibal's jealousy is making him rude.


End file.
